dant and it is rare that a plant does not produce sufficient
blooms for a full crop. The flowers are perfect as far as parts are
concerned (Fig. 2) and in bright, sunny weather there is an abundance of
pollen, but sunlight and warmth are essential to its maturing into a
condition in which it can easily reach the stigma. The structure and
development of the flower are such that while occasionally, particularly
in healthy plants out of doors, the stigma becomes receptive and takes
the pollen as it is pushed out through the stamen tube by the elongating
style, it is more often pushed beyond them before the pollen matures, so
that the pollen has to reach the stigma through some other means.
Usually this is accomplished by the wind, either directly or through the
motion of the plants.

Under glass it is generally necessary to assist the fertilization either
directly by application or by motion of the plant, this latter only
being effective in the middle of a bright sunny day. In the open ground
in cold, damp weather the flowers often fail of fertilization, in which
case they drop, and this is often the first indication of a failing of
the crop on large, strong vines. I have known of many cases where the
yield of fruit from large and seemingly very healthy vines was very
light because continual rains prevented the pollenization of the
flowers. Such failures, however, do not always come from a want of
pollen but may result from an over or irregular supply of water either
at the root or in the air, imperfectly balanced food supply, a sapping
of the vitality of the plants when young, or from other causes. Insects
rarely visit tomato flowers and are seldom the means of their
fertilization.

=Characteristics of the fruit.=--The fruit of the original species from
which our cultivated tomatoes have developed was doubtless a
comparatively small two to many-celled berry, with comparatively dry
central placenta and thin walls. In some species the cells were
indicated by distinct sutures, forming a rough or corrugated fruit. It
has improved under cultivation by increase in size, the material
thickening of the cell walls, the development of greater juiciness and
richer flavor and a decrease in the size and dryness of the placenta, as
well as the breaking up of the cells by fleshy partitions resulting in
the disappearance of the deep sutures and an improvement in the
smoothness and beauty of the fruit. (Fig. 11.)

The quality of the fr